"Then it does not make you unhappy to be dependent, as some folks say?" said I, thinking of Felicia. The old woman smiled again. "Bless your dear heart, no! We are all dependent, child. One almost as much as another, for that matter." "You mean upon God," said I. "Aye, and upon one another. If not for bread yet for pleasant looks, and kind words, and little acts of service, such as go to make our lives happy. I have done for others in my time, and now others do for me. I did not grudge my service, and no more do they grudge theirs. And all comes from God, first and last, and may be given again to Him if we will. When I lived with my mistress down in Devonshire, and up to London, I had many times to put up with whims and fancies, and hard words. Not from her, though—she was ever a sweet-tempered lady—but from others of the family. But I said to myself, ''Tis all in the day's work,' and strove to take all cheerfully." "Aye, that is it!" said Dick. "''Tis all in the day's work,' and what matter, so we but serve our Master faithfully, and are rewarded of Him at the last." "How cheerful Dame Crump is," said I, when we had finished our walk, and were lingering in the church, looking at our father's pulpit, and his tablet on the chancel wall. "I wish I were like her." "You do not wish you were ninety-eight years old, do you?" asked my brother. "Why, I don't know—yes! If I were as ready to go as she, I think I would like to be as old. I always do envy good old people, they are so near home." "We none of us know how near home we may be," said Richard. I assented, thinking of my poor father. Never had he seemed stronger or more sanguine than on the very day he had that fatal seizure. "But, Peggy, my love, why not take the old woman's motto for your own?" continued Richard. "Is it not a good one? ''Tis all in the day's work!'" "Can 'you' take it, Dick?" I asked, in wonder. "Standing here before my father's pulpit, in which you so ardently hoped to preach, can you be content to say—'It is all in the day's work'?" "Yes, I can, Peggy!" replied Richard, firmly, though I saw his eyelash twinkle. "Standing here—even here—I can say, 'God's will be done!'" "Well, I can't!" said I, passionately enough. "It does seem very hard to me, and I can't help it!"